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multiple attempts at gmat

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multiple attempts at gmat

by confusedaboutgmat » Mon Feb 07, 2011 9:14 am
Hi All,

I took my gmat last year and scored 700. I am a good student and I was expecting a better score, so I decided to take it again.

I studied whole of Jan and took a few mock tests whose scores are as follows
manhattan 1 - 700
manhattan 2 - 740
manhattan 3 - 750
manhattan 4 - 680
manhattan 5 - 750
GmatPrep 1 - 750
GmatPrep 2 - 740

After getting scores like these, I was expecting to get around 740 in my attempt. On the day of gmat I was not feeling well but still took the exam and ended up scoring only 660.

I have a few questions
1. Is it advisable to take the gmat again?
2. Does taking gmat multiple times can decrease your chances in getting a call?
3. If I don't take gmat again. Will it be a problem for me that I scored less in my 2nd attempt than my 1st attempt?

Thanks in advance
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by michaelfaulkner » Mon Feb 07, 2011 2:33 pm
What was your %tile break down for the 700?

And no, multiple attempts will not hurt your admission chances. 99% of schools take your highest score and do not take into consideration lower scored attempts what-so-ever.
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by confusedaboutgmat » Mon Feb 07, 2011 10:47 pm
Thanks michaelfaulkner.

My breakup for 700 is
quant 50
Verbal 33
Essay 4.5
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by michaelfaulkner » Fri Feb 11, 2011 1:30 pm
Your quant is really good. Are you a native English speaker?

If not, maybe you should hone in on your verbal skills and give it another shot.

Worst case scenario is that you get a lower score that won't count towards your admissions.
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by Brian@VeritasPrep » Fri Feb 11, 2011 1:43 pm
Hey confused...

My advice on this is always this: Do you think you can do significantly better? If you're just taking the test again in hopes of getting a higher score, it's probably not worthwhile. But in your case, I think the evidence is there to suggest that you should do quite a bit better. Your practice test scores were significantly higher on official exams; you've already hit 700 so you know that it's possible and you undoubtedly worked on some of the items that held you back that time.

Can you pinpoint anything that held you back on this attempt? Pacing? A set of questions that you hadn't anticipated? A drop in your stronger suit because you focused too much on the weaker? The more that you can specifically identify as "I'll definitely do that better next time", the more you should consider retaking the exam. If it's just a shot in the dark, though, it's harder to justify.

As far as taking multiple attempts, unless it's something egregious it shouldn't hold you back in admissions at all. In many cases, schools make their decisions on you based on your self-reported score (what you type in on your application) and just go back to the official report on file to confirm it. It's rarer than people think that schools will analyze your entire testing history all that deeply. If you're confident that there's a good chance at your hitting 730 or 740, that confidence far outweighs the pretty remote likelihood that you'd score lower and that someone would start to scrutinize your history as a result.
Brian Galvin
GMAT Instructor
Chief Academic Officer
Veritas Prep

Looking for GMAT practice questions? Try out the Veritas Prep Question Bank. Learn More.
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by confusedaboutgmat » Mon Feb 14, 2011 2:06 am
@Michael
Thanks Michael,

No, I am not a native english speaker, but this time I really worked on it. I was consistently scoring around 40 in the mocks, when I took GMAT.

@Brian
Thanks Brian, that helps a lot.

I prepared a lot for GMAT but unfortunately i didn't get the result I expected after taking the practice tests. If that's the case then I will take GMAT again because I can't let my efforts go in vain and I am sure that I can score more than 730.

I really don't know what happened that day. During the exam I knew that it's not going well. I think I had such huge expectations that I became nervous. As I wanted to score really high, I was reading every option twice to make sure that I am selecting the best possible answer. I was also continuously checking the remaining time, which I think made me tensed.

I would like to ask one more question.

I am planning to apply to a few universities with my 700 score until I take GMAT again. Suppose I get a score of 730+, can I ask these universities to consider my new score?

Thanks again!
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